Virus attacks: who is to blame?

Tuesday, 16 September 2003, 1:21 PM EST

August was possibly the busiest month in the history of computer viruses: 800 new viruses were detected. Although this is not an unusually high number, four particularly widespread viruses - Mimail, Blaster, Nachi and Sobig - all seriously compromised security.

These viruses caused widespread infections and spread using a variety of methods. Thousands of companies worldwide found they were not protected against the viruses or had not appropriately patched their operating system.

Amid the onslaught, some businesses reliant on the internet may have questioned whether it is worthwhile to stay connected and must have feared that every moment of an IT manager's day will be spent updating anti-virus software and patching operating systems. But although there are disadvantages to being connected to the outside world, there are many advantages.

In a networked economy, businesses have the advantage of quicker, automated communication with their customers, suppliers and partners. Companies no longer need to devote so much energy to time-consuming manual processes such as snail mail.

Spotlight

By working with the DevOps team, you can ensure that the production environment is more predictable, auditable and more secure than before. The key is to integrate your security requirements into the DevOps pipeline.

A critical vulnerability in ANTlabs InnGate devices, a popular Internet gateway for visitor-based networks and commonly installed in hotels and convention centers, has been discovered. The flaw could allow an attacker to monitor or tamper with traffic to and from any hotel WiFi user's connection.

In this interview, Raj Samani, VP and CTO EMEA at Intel Security, talks about successful information security strategies aimed at the critical infrastructure, government challenges, the role of regulation, and more.